Thorndon’s housing heritage

The Thorndon houses shown above have been altered sympathetically on the street scape. Including grannie flats on top of garages; garages with apartments either above on the streetscape or behind or next to the existing dwelling depending on what the site allowed for. This work was needed either to accommodate the owner’s normal family needs or to help increase the value of the property or generate income so that the owner could afford to maintain and sympathetically restore and preserve the main house.

The Thorndon houses shown above have been altered sympathetically on the street scape. Including grannie flats on top of garages; garages with apartments either above on the streetscape or behind or next to the existing dwelling depending on what the site allowed for. This work was needed either to accommodate the owner’s normal family needs or to help increase the value of the property or generate income so that the owner could afford to maintain and sympathetically restore and preserve the main house.

The images above illustrate that there are lots and lots of houses, flats and apartments in every Thorndon street that are not heritage. Therefore, putting a heritage classification on an entire street/s is obviously inappropriate. It cannot be justified as many properties/dwellings in the streets are not original. A better solution could be to identify individual dwellings that fit a predetermined and agreed set of heritage criteria.

These photos show blocks of townhouses that can never be built in Thorndon again, because WCC have already introduced new planning rules to stop them being repeated e.g.townhouses on the corner Barton Tce and Lewisville Tce. Also, townhouses on Grant Rd, Harriet St, Goring St, Pitarua St, Tinakori Rd etc.

WCC have already introduced restrictions. This includes “Variation 14 “, about 10 yrs ago, after the Barton Tce townhouses were built. This introduced new rules relating to inner-city character and multi-unit developments, particularly for Mt Victoria and Thorndon. “Plan Change 56” was introduced within the last year or two to stop all the townhouses being built again. Outdoor areas cannot be decks on the 2nd level anymore. Living areas must now be opening onto 50m2 outdoor area (35m2 soft/lawn plus 15m2 hard/paved). Add on to this a ground level car park/garage and a decent size ground floor living dining and kitchen with hall and a stairway, and you can quickly see why 3 townhouses could never fit on the Barton Rd site again.

There are many other restrictions in Plan change 56 including: only single storey dwellings can be built on occupied sites less than 800m2. That is a huge lot size.